


Paramour, Nevermore

by callunavulgari



Series: Dark Month Collection [47]
Category: Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time
Genre: M/M, Zombies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-23
Updated: 2013-10-23
Packaged: 2017-12-30 05:35:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1014759
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/callunavulgari/pseuds/callunavulgari
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No one wants to feel sadness or fear—no mother wishes to feel the pain of losing a child, just as no child truly wishes for the death of a beloved parent. However, as the war comes, tragedy becomes a way of life. There is no tiptoeing about the issue, no way to possibly avoid it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Paramour, Nevermore

**Author's Note:**

> Dark Month, Day 22. I had a nasty case of writer's block last night, so instead of fighting with something new, I took an old fic from like 2008 that I never posted and cleaned it up. ...A little. My writing style has changed so much since then, holy shit.

Often times, there are tragedies in life. These tragedies are appalling, devastating things that most sentient creatures skirt around, things that Hyrule as a whole tries to avoid. No one wants to feel sadness or fear—no mother wishes to feel the pain of losing a child, just as no child truly wishes for the death of a beloved parent. However, as the war comes, tragedy becomes a way of life. There is no tiptoeing about the issue, no way to possibly avoid it.  
   
So, you had a child that was foolish enough to wander into the night, and now that child has been torn to shreds by some beast from the darkness. That is their way of life. Hylians have become accustomed to this kind of tale. It requires no sympathy, no apologies, or coos of understanding. Every Hylian, Goron, Gerudo, and Zora in Hyrule has lost someone dear to them.  
   
However, some tragedies are greater than others, and that is the fact of the matter. The loss of a child cannot compare to the loss of a city—perhaps in the eyes of a loved one, but to the country as a whole? One child’s life would be well worth losing thousands of people.  
   
For years, the land of Hyrule waited, sobbing and bleeding in the dark. The Hylians, the Gorons, even the Zora’s in their icy prison waited for that one savior. The boy that so few remembered from his childhood. Rumor had it that he was dead. Some said that the King of Darkness himself had slain him, moments before the boy’s fingers had touched the Triforce. Others thought that perhaps in his haste to reach the temple he had forgotten to keep a wary eye on his surroundings, and been slain by monsters, or even bandits on his way.  
   
But Sheik knew better. He had seen the hero in Princess Zelda’s dreams—dreams that she had shared with him when she sensed his fear, just beneath the surface of his skin. The Hero of Time was sleeping. Sleeping in some holy place that cast shining blue lights upon his slumbering features.  
   
Sheik’s first thought upon awakening from the dream was that this Hero of Hyrule that everyone spoke of was far too beautiful. Too pretty and dainty to be a man destined to slay the King of Evil. The glimpse he’d had was fleeting, but he had not seen some sculpted hero, not like the heroes of legend. He’d seen a scrawny boy, elfin and pale, beautiful as any maid. His immediate thought after that had been that the previous thought had been Zelda’s. She had laughed at him, her voice tinkling like bells inside of his head. Yes, he was lovely now, that was true, she teased, but the thought had not been hers.   
   
When Sheik had been young, a boy of just thirteen, he had been offended when Impa had come to him, dragging a frightened princess along behind her. He had bickered with her the way a Sheikah was forbidden to do, saying that he did not want to be but a vessel to a foolish girl clutching her skirts. He wanted to fight when the time came, fight at the side of this mysterious savior. So no, he would not hide the princess’s soul within his own while her body slept, safe in the Sacred Realm.  
   
The slap Impa had dealt him had been sharp, a stinging pain, the redness spreading across his cheek hidden away by the winding swathes of fabric crisscrossing most of his face. Further more, the shame he had felt when she had voiced her disappointment in him had been exceedingly worse. And so, he had agreed. He would protect the soul of his princess, and stay out of harms way, doomed to watch over Hyrule from afar.  
   
For years, he watched Hyrule bleed, with only Zelda’s weeping in the far corner of his heart to comfort him in the darkest hours of the night. He had watched Ganondorf, and his hatred had simmered, a fine webbing of flame.  
   
Then the day came when the Hero awoke. So sudden, after so much waiting, and he was awake. Zelda urged him to go, against Impa’s orders—brave the road long enough to get to the remnants of Castletown, she told him. In the gloom of their room, they bickered like children.   
  
_You must be protected_ , he insisted, though he longed to do as she bid.  
   
Finally, they came to an understanding. He would brave the streets and travel to the temple so he would be there to greet the Hero, but no more.  
   
Her happiness made his soul warm, and beneath his scarf, he blushed hotly.  
   
The journey there took nearly half a day. It wasn’t that it was far away, just that Sheik was in the habit of leaping behind trees and into streams when anything passed by. This annoyed Zelda, especially after getting swept down a stream that Sheik had leapt into when he’d been startled by the creaking laugh of a Poe.  
   
After creeping past the Redeads in Castletown though, they finally arrived.  
   
Too soon, it seemed, as the only company to be found inside the temple were the jewels that still glittered prettily upon the altar. Sheik’s footsteps echoed loudly against the marble as he padded his way across the room. He knelt before the altar of the Three, less to hear Zelda’s praise and more to run his fingers over the glittering gems before him.  
   
Seven years ago, the Hero had held these. All those years ago, the Hero had fought to win these, fought and bled so he could save Hyrule. He would be surprised to awaken all these years later, Sheik thought. The hero had presumably been under the impression that obtaining these would have been the end to his journey. He wondered if the savior would want to return home.  
   
He did not have long to contemplate this, however, for even as the thought crossed his mind, the whistle of magics sounded from the adjoining room. For a moment, his thoughts were alight with panic and fright, and he wondered just how much of it was his, and just how much was Zelda’s. He quickly climbed to the rafters, and held his breath. He could almost hear Zelda’s phantom breath ghosting across his skull, he was so quiet.  
   
And then they saw him, and Sheik felt that his heart would stop.  
   
He had been perfectly lovely in Zelda’s vision, yes, but here… he was far more beautiful. Sheik took a moment to admire him—drinking in the loveliness hidden by that strange green tunic. He was pale, a figure of ivory, with eyes like blue fire. His golden hair brushed against the fabric at his shoulders, and he admired the elegance of the Hero's pointed ears. He was thin, as he had been in the dream, and still fair, but a far cry from the muscular figure Sheik had imagined when he was a child.  
   
Only Zelda’s voice in his ear urged him to move from his hiding place, and he sprang down from the rafters and into the room the hero had emerged from. The Hero was walking about the temple now, and Sheik’s breath caught in his throat when the younger man crouched before the altar he had just been kneeling at. The light of the jewels glimmered against his downturned face, lighting one cheek green and the other a pretty blue.  
   
He must have made some noise then, a small involuntary swallow or something, for the Hero jerked as if he was shocked, and turned to look at him. Sheik’s voice was frozen somewhere in the vicinity of his throat, and he thought that he would gladly welcome death if this were the man whom was slaying him. The man’s blue eyes held him pinned to the spot, yet beckoning to him like a siren’s call.  
  
 _Be still, and your death will be sweet_ , the hero’s gaze assured him.  
   
Only when the Hero started to walk towards him did he react, regaining his voice. Sheik spoke some codswallop that he only half heard, some philosophical bullshit about the winds and the water, and how in his journey this man would have to travel all over Hyrule, Zelda’s words drowned in his voice.  
   
The man accepted it with a nod of his head, though his eyes were wary. Sheik mentioned the forests, and hoped the man knew to go back to his home for now. To journey to the Forest temple. Perhaps the annoying fairy would enlighten him if he did not. Sheik stopped talking, as if his vocal cords had been severed when he ran out of script. They were done, now the Hero could go and do what he was born to do.  
   
He waited patiently as the man gazed at him, biting his lip when the hero began to circle him. He fought the urge to turn around when the hero walked behind him, and when the savior returned to his line of sight his eyes were traveling up and down Sheik’s body, as if attempting to come to some form of decision. Sheik felt his cheeks grow hot beneath his protection, but still, he did not move.  
   
Another moment and the man—this hero of legend—met his eyes once more. That fierceness was still present within them, but a certain tension seemed to have been released, for his shoulders drooped and his eyes warmed.  
   
He smiled.   
  
The smile lit up his entire face, and Sheik nearly felt faint. It was the kind of smile that welcomes you in, that urges you to smile as well. He could even feel himself doing so, the slight quirking of his lips, the almost laugh bubbling up in his throat.  
   
The Hero walked the last few steps up to the pedestal where he stood, so that when he finally stopped, he was just before him, his glittering blue eyes level with Sheik’s red ones. Still smiling, he extended a hand. The hand was elegant, callused, but slim; almost delicate, with long fingers and a broad palm. Even his wrist was pretty.  
   
When Sheik looked away from the man’s hand, his face was flushed and he could hardly stop himself from wondering how that smooth looking hand would feel against his skin. He was blushing so badly that he wondered if the other man could see it, if the flush had risen above his cheeks to paint the bridge of his nose. All the same, he met the man’s eyes, and blushed even harder to find the man still smiling at him, his hand unmoved between them.  
   
“I’m Link.”  
   
His voice was quiet, as if he didn’t know how to be loud. It held the trace of some strange accent to it, a curl to the L sound, and a melodious kind of resonance that made Sheik think of the quiet of the forest, and the rushing of a brook.  
   
Link. His name was Link. He fought the urge to try the name out, but he couldn’t stop himself from repeating the name back to the man. Link nodded, and his grin brightened. Sheik looked down at the hand before him, and back up at Link.  
   
Though Link couldn’t see it, he smiled back.  
   
“Sheik.”  
   
The hand before him quivered. He took it.  
   
.  
   
For the better part of a year he watches Link. He guides him, in a roundabout manner that makes Zelda grow irritated with him. He can tell that Link is frustrated with him as well, so Sheik smiles every time he watches those blue eyes light up in anger. He keeps his words vague, and near incomprehensible most of the time, half hidden in metaphors and cloaked smiles.  
   
Zelda makes fun of him, because he is practically writing poetry for the Hero of Time. But her teasing has been unable to provoke a reaction from him for quite some time, and he laughs with her when she does it, telling her that he would go down on hands and knees before Link to get the kinds of reaction that speaking poetry gets.  
   
It is fun—so very much fun to see that little line between Link’s brows, to hear him begin to say something and then stop when he realizes that he’s speaking to thin air. The best part is always vanishing on him in the end, and lingering behind to hear the other man curse and growl his frustration to the wind.  
   
He nearly laughs when Link tries to catch him in the fire temple. The pattern continues every time after that as well—Link forever trying to catch him before he can vanish. Sheik looks forward to the day that he does finally catch him.  
   
The first temple is probably the hardest for Link. The Forest Temple, while not as terribly dangerous as the others, is damned confusing and Sheik nearly gets himself hurt just trying to follow the Hero about it. It takes him a couple days to get through the whole temple, and Link spends the nights just outside, bunking at the very top of an extremely large tree. He’d tried camping on the ground the first night, and been rather annoyed to find that no matter how many times you slayed the wolfos, their brothers just returned to take their place.  
   
Sheik isn’t altogether sure where he should camp for the night, so he crouches in the shadows of the entrance, napping on and off until dawn appears and he hears Link coming down from the tree, cursing about a sore back.  
   
He defeats the phantom that is haunting the temple though, and kills the poes that are guarding it.  
   
Sheik follows him like that throughout the other temples as well. Gone is any and all worry of earning Impa’s ire. He knows his strengths and Zelda knows hers. He pitters around behind the hero through the fire temple and nearly has a heart attack when Link falls nearly four floors trying to get to that damned hammer of the Gorons. Luckily, Link appears mostly unharmed, flushed, disheveled, and a bit singed about the ankles, but alive and attempting the ridiculous deed again.  
   
This time, he makes it all the way up the steps, but burns himself when time runs out and the flames spring up once more.  
   
They spend their days like this, Link attempting various ridiculous quests and Sheik watching him with a mixture of fear and amusement, and Zelda a whispering voice in his head, poking fun at the both of them.  
   
She thinks it’s stupid—not just Link doing stupid things that get himself hurt, but Sheik watching Link do these things and then getting hurt himself. She wishes he would just work with Link, because they’re in danger either way.  
   
It is only when Link is emerging from the Water temple, soaking wet and annoyed that there is any progress between them at all. Their most recent meeting had been in the ice cave, with its cavern of stars that let their music carry so well. When Sheik had vanished that time, Link had looked positively feral, snarling at his fairy and slamming his new boots on so he could sink below the water’s surface. Even Zelda had commented on it, telling Sheik that it would probably be wise to actually wait around for Link during their next meeting.  
   
This time, with the sun shining down on their necks, and Sheik prepared to stay by Link’s side for a day or so, it happens. Sheik doesn’t get the chance to tell Link that he plans to stay, because Link lunges for him before he even opens his mouth. He has a moment to be truly afraid, staring down into angry blue eyes and registering the fact that Link’s hands are fisted in the fabric at his chest, and then Link kisses him.  
   
His mind shuts down. His eyes go wide and his arms go slack in the Hero’s grip. Link hasn’t even pulled down the wrappings covering his face, and yet he can still feel the Hero’s lips against his through the cloth. He thinks for a moment that he is in shock, and wonders about the strange silence coming from the corner of his mind that Zelda usually occupies.  
   
He is silent as Link’s lips move against his, and he can’t even think of responding. But Link will have none of that, evidently, because he growls at the lack of response and shoves him back until Sheik’s back encounters rough bark. The tree, of course; he’d nearly forgotten where he was. Link is positively vicious now, nipping at the wrapping covering Sheik’s lips so that they begin to come undone.  
   
Sheik’s eyes are still open, though they are not looking at anything in particular, and he feels it would be better manners to close them. Link lets out a sound of frustration, and slams him back against the tree so hard that stars burst into being within his vision. Then Link presses fully against him, nudging his hips up into Sheik’s and grinding them together almost painfully. Sheik gasps against the hero’s mouth as he feels Link’s hardness pressed against his stomach. He thinks through the haze in his mind that it is very unfair for him to be nearly three years older than this boy and still be shorter than him. After a moment more of snarling from Link, Sheik begins to kiss back.  
   
After that is a blur of sound and smell. Link yanks at the bandages covering his face and hair and their lips meet without the obstruction of cloth. They grind against each other, panting and groaning, and not caring who can see them. Everything vanishes in a whirl of complex actions and emotions that Sheik can’t quite ever remember feeling so intensely. The war is no more—Ganondorf never got farther than Gerudo valley, and Princess Zelda was never lurking about in the back of his head like some kind of schizophrenic nightmare. This boy is all that was and ever will be.  
   
Link comes against his stomach, staining the eye of truth in a way that Sheik knows will get him in trouble with Impa later. He doesn’t have much time to think about that though, because not a moment later Link crouches before him, licking and suckling him through his trousers. He looks down at Link, his eyes wide and dark with pleasure, half frightened, half intrigued because no one is permitted to see this much of a Sheikah’s body and live to tell about it.  
   
Link looks up at him through lowered lashes, and the look is so intense that Sheik has to shudder at it. And then Link is pushing down the waistband of his trousers and he has a moment to feel the cold, early morning lakeside air against his cock before Link swallows him whole.  
   
He cries out, writhing against the tree, his hand hovering just above Link’s golden head as if unsure of whether it would be rude or not to coax him further onto his cock. In the end, he decides he doesn’t care if it’s good manners or not because Link has pinned him to a tree, and well, that was bad manners, so why not?  
   
Link’s hair feels incredibly smooth to his hands, almost silky, and he wonders if it’s just the rush of pleasure or if the hero’s hair is actually so silken, even while wet. He thinks it unlikely for any hero to have hair like this. He takes a fistful of it and pushes against the back of that golden head, guiding him, because he needs more—  
   
His orgasm takes him by surprise, and he convulses against the tree, biting into one palm to muffle the shout while his other hand clenches and unclenches in Link’s hair.  
   
Only after he comes down from his high does he let go of Link’s hair, and the man pulls back, licking his lips like one of the prostitutes who go prancing about Kakariko after sunset.  
   
Sheik falls back against the tree, his chest heaving, while Link leans against him, looking entirely too pleased with himself.  
   
“I hope that finally caught your damned attention,” is what he finally says. Sheik glares at him, and looks down at his sodden clothes. Wordlessly, he pushes against Link until he finally moves. He starts removing his clothes completely as he walks nearer to the water, trying not to look as self-conscious as he feels while doing so. He kneels at the edge of the water in just his skin, and tries not to shake. Revealing this much of his body to another person, much less a man, would be a death sentence if he and Impa weren’t the only two left.  
   
He shakes his head and tries not to think of his people’s laws—his is a dead culture, and no one is alive to stop him. He bathes his clothes in the water, scrubbing at the stains until the cloth resembles normalcy. He returns to the tree, studiously not looking at Link as he does so. The lowest hanging branch is still rather high up, and annoyingly enough, even on tiptoes he can’t reach it. He knows he could easily reach the branch if he leapt, or climbed the tree, but strangely, he doesn’t feel like doing many acrobatics while he’s naked.  
   
He feels a presence at his back, and tries not to flinch when Link brushes up behind him. Link does nothing, and is very quiet about taking the clothes from him and hanging them over the branch. He barely has to stand on tiptoe to reach it. Annoying.  
   
He spares a glance at Link, who is looking at him. His face grows hot, and he pads back over to the edge of the water. He wades in, carefully, and breathes a sigh of relief when he feels instantly cleaner.  
   
Link is lounging by the bank when he resurfaces, the man looking more content than Sheik has ever seen him. He sees Sheik looking at him and smiles. Sheik can’t help but smile back.  
   
.  
   
The months pass quickly after the incident at the lake and Sheik feels wretched during the quiet moments, because in the time that Link spends in his company the Hero doesn’t really do anything. He feels as if he should be ashamed that he is keeping Hyrule from her Hero, and Zelda herself urges him to believe so as well. She doesn’t mind the strange relationship as much as Sheik thought she would when he’d felt the strange silence from her after the incident. She mostly seemed rather amused by it. She insisted that her silence was her giving him as much privacy as she could.  
   
Eventually though, he has to urge Link to continue on his quest. Their parting is sweet, and the sex is excellent, but Link looks so somber when he is leaving that Sheik almost wants to tell him that he’ll be nearby anyways.  
   
The next time Sheik sees him, all he can remember is the well in Kakariko and pain. He wakes up in Impa’s old house, spread out on the bed and hurting all over with Link hovering about him worriedly.  
   
Link smiles when he sees him awake, and he is smothered with kisses before he can really breathe. He pushes Link away, laughing, and pain shoots up his spine. He stops laughing.  
   
Link stays with him overnight, but in the morning, he tells him that he fixed the well while Sheik was asleep, but he has to go to the Shadow Temple. Sheik isn’t sure that him being in the Shadow Temple without backup is a very good idea, but lets him go because he hurts, and there is no deterring Link anyway, not really.  
   
He accepts the kiss Link bestows upon him without fuss, even leans up enough so that he can pull Link down to the bed with him. They indulge for a bit until Sheik winces when their activities manages to open up some wound and blood leaks out to soak into the bandages.  
   
Link leaves an hour later, after his wounds have been redressed, and Sheik is left to an empty house and a head full of Zelda voicing her complaints.   
I have a bad feeling about this, she hisses.  
  
Sheik ignores her and tries not to remember what her bad feelings have meant for Hyrule before.  
   
When Link comes limping back days later, with no visible wound in sight, yet trembling with effort, Sheik goes white with fear. Link collapses against the bed, face ashen and eyes clenched in pain.  
   
Sheik tries fumbling about Link’s clothes, searching for the wound for several minutes until Link hisses out the location.  
   
The bite is on his shoulder, swollen and nearly black already. He almost wishes that he doesn’t know what caused the bite. He is careful not to touch the wound more than necessary, and lays Link down with promises that he will be alright. The nearest Fairy’s Fountain is miles away, but where else will he get the amount of Holy Water required to do the job?  
   
He warps to the Sacred Meadow and is almost at the Fountain before he realizes that it would be easier to bring Link back to the Fountain. Berating himself, he warps to the Shadow Temple, trying not to think of how much the Nocturne of Shadow sounds like a funeral dirge, and hurries back to the village. When he gets to the hut, Link is shaking, and the blackness is spreading up his neck. He is very pale, and when Sheik tries to move him he groans.  
   
He is so terrified. So, so, scared that he can hardly think straight. He can almost hear Impa’s low voice during his teachings.  
   
A redead’s bite is powerful. They are slow, yes, but once they bite you, you have naught but an hour to remove the venom. Just hope that should you ever be on the receiving end of one of their bites that you are near some source of holy water. If you are not, be sure to turn the knife on yourself before the venom reaches your brain, lest you become one of their kind.  
   
In the end, he hauls Link over his shoulders. It obstructs his movement, and makes playing his Harp near impossible. However, after several tries he manages to pluck the notes of the Minuet of the Forest.  
   
By the time he reaches the Fairy’s fountain, Link is convulsing in his arms. He throws him into the water, going down on his knees beside him. The infection has spread to his temples now, and the black looks like what it is, poison creeping through his bloodstream, turning his veins dark with sickness.  
   
He cries and weeps upon Link’s face, and can feel Zelda in the back of his mind, sick with horror. Link begins to thrash, blue eyes rolling up into his head. Even the fairies nearby will not come close now, as if they know the sickness that runs through his veins.  
   
He holds Link into the water, and cries out when the water begins burning through their Hero’s skin. Too Late, Zelda whimpers in his mind, and he shakes his head. This is not the end. Link is supposed to save Hyrule. Ganondorf isn’t dead yet, please, Link, please.  
   
After several moments, the thrashing stops, and Sheik feels sick to his stomach. He can’t look. He can’t. When he looks down at Link, it looks as if their Hero is sleeping. His face is still just as angelic as it was the day Sheik met him, his hair still as golden, his hands still as delicate and beautiful. The only thing marring the face is the thin lines of grey that travel up his temples like worms.  
   
His tears are hot against Sheik's face, and his eyes are swollen. The Hero of Time lies still in his lap, and he waits for the moment when the eyes will open and he himself will be slain. He wonders what will happen to Princess Zelda if his body is destroyed. Oddly enough, she is quiet on the matter, and he realizes that it doesn’t matter anymore.  
   
This was the Hero of Time, the savior of Hyrule. It did not matter if the princess perished anymore. Truly, she did not want to live to see her kingdom a place of ruin, rather die than watch in silence as her people suffered.  
   
Hyrule would fall. Everyone would eventually perish under Ganondorf’s rule. He wonders what type of world it will be. How much could things worsen? How many more people would be tortured and killed for their king’s amusement? Zelda didn’t want to know.  
   
His arms tighten around Link. He wonders what it would be like to be mauled to death by a newly born Redead. Probably painful, he warns Zelda. A shudder goes through the body he’s clutching and he feels a sharp stab of fear run down his spine.   
   
He should kill it now, turn away, leave and try to help the people any way he can. Another shudder goes through the body as he picks up his knife and holds it, confused and undecided. One more shudder, and he sets down the knife, renewing his grip on Link’s body. He watches Link, trying to remember how entranced he’d been that first time they met, how beautiful he’d thought he was.  
   
As he watches in horror, Link’s eyes open.  
  



End file.
